Letters of Lydia Maria Child, with a biographical introduction by John G. Whittier and an appendix by Wendell Phillips.

94 LETTERS.
By the same token he ought to consider Grecian
mythology proved, because Olympus and Parnassus
are still standing; and a sight of them ought to
strengthen his faith in Jupiter and the Muses. What
a fuss they have made about finding the name of
Jonahl: among the inscriptions at Nineveh! Does
that prove that the whale swallowed him, and that
he did not "set easy" on the whale's stomach? I
can never get over wondering at the external tendency of a large class of minds.
TO 3IISS ANNA LORING.
WVAYLAND, December 10, 1857.
I wanted very much to introduce to you a baby I
met in the cars. She was a fat little thing, not two
years old, but as quick as a steel-trap. She was on
the opposite side of the cars, but insisted upon trying
to stretch her short fat arm across to me, with her
hand open, repeating, " How do?"' I am pretty
well," said I. "How do you do?" "Mart" (smart),
was her quick reply. And this scene she wanted to
enact every five minutes, to the great amusement of
those around her. At last a little boy came in, about
a year older than herself, and was placed on the seat
behind her. Feeling the necessity of keeping up the
character of her sex for propriety, she took a good
deal of trouble to get at him, and push him, saying,
"You do'way! you do'way!" The boy, who seemed
to be as timid as she was " mart,"' shrunk himself up
as close as possible, probably having a prophetic
sense of the position it becomes his sex to assume, if
they regard their own safety, in these days when
women are getting to be so "mart." At last he
elimbed the seat and turned his back to her...